Kingmaker: Lures of Majesty

Festivities, Alliances and Old Musty Things Best Left Forgotten

Game 26
Game Dates: Arodus (August) 28, Second Year of Svenheim – Calistri (February) 5, Third Year of Svenheim

Kruznic, Haylex and Caleesee all took a trip into Brevoy on family matters and returned a month later just before the Autumn snows began to fall.

The entire autumn and into most of the winter months the Ruling Council stayed in Svenheim and attended to government and family. No exploration or adventuring was done. It gave the council almost half a year to concentrate on the business of growing Svenheim in a better nation.

In Rova (September) the economy did very well and the militia had to deal with a large group of worgs causing problems to the south.

Lamashan (October) through Abadius (January) the economy continued to do well with the council’s guidance. Svenheim’s borders extended to the north with more farms and west into the Narlmarches during an expansion period. The Baroness Svetlana announced that she is pregnant again with the child due in July or August.

Late in Abadius (January) the Ruling Council receive an invitation to attend a festival of Erastil in Varnhold. They decide to accept the invitation and invite along their new friend Nyrissa (whom they refer to as Goldie).

At the festival Sven asks about the centaur conflict. Maegar Varn explains that Varnhold has been involved in a ongoing fight with the Nomean centaurs. Varnhold does not have an army, but they do have a highly mobile militia. The militia are more like scouts, fighting on light horses so to better fight the mobile centaurs.

Maegar Varn goes on to speak about the tense political situation on Brevoy as well as the dangers that surround the Stolen Lands like aggressive River Kingdoms. He suggests that it would probably be useful for both nations to unite forces because it would provide us stability against outside forces. Sven discusses forming an alliance with the ruling council and everyone agrees it is a good idea to accept Varn’s offer. To seal the alliance Sven cuts his hand and spits in his hand, Varn does the same. They two shake and Sven tells Varn that their two nations are now blood brothers. Varn also promises his daughter’s hand in marriage to a son of Sven’s. Sven agrees that his second son, Annar Haylex Svenson, will marry his daughter when they both come of age.

In the festival, there are several different contests. Kruznic decides to enter the archer contest. He competes with three other competitors and wins. He donates his winnings to the people of Varhold.

Sven, Kruznic and Caleesee compete in the fishing competition. Caleesee wins and is proposed for marriage by two drunken fisherman. Caleesee and Kruznic compete in the log chopping competetion. Kruznic barely beats Caleesee and she receives several glares from women spectators. She receives several more marriage propose and Heylex convinces them that they should go talk to someone else. Several townsfolk cheer, referring to Kruznic as the “unkillable general” (since he has risen from the dead at least twice). The party has some drinks as Maegar Varn’s guests and return to Svenhien the next day.

Kruznic’s wife returns and he admits that he found out that she was actually kidnapped and did not run away. He admits that she is actually a spy from the North to spy on our kingdom to make sure we do not build an army to rebel against Brevoy. Kruznic says she has since she fell in love with him that she had been used as a double spy by Kruznic and Sven. The council does not see her as a threat and decides to leave it alone.

The party goes out exploring the lands to the south and comes across a Cairen deep in the woods. They walk down a long dark hallway and into a room where an old tomb is with a skeleton. On the old skeleton, Caleesee spots a magical ring.

Suddenly they hear an old raspy voice demand, “Be banished , those of you who rob the king!”.
They look and see a skeleton in tattered robes standing in the room with them. Caleesee knows that the one speaking is a crypt thing, they are commonly found in protected barrows to protect the dead.

The crypt thing makes Hailex and then Sven disappear from the room. Seven skeletons rise and attack the remaining party. Caleesee channels positive energy killing all of the skeletons.
Looking around Hailex and Sven notices that they were teleported above the Cairen. They rush back inside to their friends. They all confront the crypt thing again.

“Who’s crypt is this my land?!!” Sven demands.

" A great barbarian king!" the thing answers.

" And what is this king’s name???" Sven asks.

“He has no name!” the thing says loudly.
“A king with no name, is no king!” Sven boasts.
" You shall go no further!!!!" the thing says as it steps behind Sven. The party turns on the crypt thing and slay it.

The party continues on to the next room which contains yet another crypt. The floor is made of dwarven steel. In the crypt, the skeleton is tightly clutching a sword. Hailex can tell that the sword is magical and magic is leaking from it because it is broken. Krunznic can detect an evil presence coming form the skeleton corpse. Kruznic runs up and attacks him.

The skeleton rises up out of its crypt. Nyrissa fires several magic missiles at it. The corpse yells “Thieves!!!”. Sven runs up and slams his axe into it saying, " This is my kingdom!!!!!!".

The skeleton attacks Sven back saying “You will serve me as you all have done before!!!”.

It seems to be getting more powerful as it hits Sven. Nyrissa fires more magic missiles.

“You are nothing if you have no name!!!” Sven yells as he attacks.

Kruznic finishes the battle with a well aimed blow and the skeleton explodes.

Looking around, Hailex can tell that the floor is mechanical in nature and attempts to find out how to use it. He finds a lever behind a fresco’s dwarf ear. He pulls one of the levers and spikes pop up on him. Caleesee and she heals him.

After a few more tries and healing, Haylex succeeds. The panel starts clicking slowly and down from the ceiling comes down something that looks like a cage. Haylex determines it is an elevator. A rock with light is tossed down the shaft in the floor and it falls and falls until engulfed by darkness.

Hailex plays with the elevator levers to get it to come back up. The party enters the elevator and Hailex uses another rock as a light source. The elevator is a complex combination of cogs, springs and dwarven engineering that we do not understand.

At the bottom Hailex can tell that we are about 2,000 feet below the surface and still going. Finally the party comes to the ground and can see stone like structures all around them and all covered in webbing. Gears turns and the door to elevator slowly opens. They can spot several large spiders in the room and they seem to standing in the center near a large structure.
Kruznic kills two spiders with arrows and the rest flee down the cliff. Kruznic lights a torch and uses it to clear away the spider webs. On the ground, their are several bones. Kruznic find a skull with no eye sockets. He sees spider tracks everywhere, but no humanoid tracks. They find dwarven runes scattered randomly around the floor.

Looking around the party sees a stairwell that leads up a big door on their left. About 100 feet in front of them, is the cliff where the spiders fled down. At the bottom of the cliff they can clearly hear running water. Behind them, is three separate hallways.

The party decides to go to the big door up the stairwell. Hailex examines the door and tells everyone that is made of steel and non-magical. He peaks through and sees a long hallway that is lined with damaged dwarven statues. On the walls ais dwarven writing.

Hailex squeezes through the door and opens it. The hallway extends for another 100 feet. There is a shattered door leading into another room at the end of the hall. Haylex reads the walls and it reads. He explains to the others that it names the long line of statues of rulers or ruler counselors. Drakor is one of the names. Caleesee explains that Drakar is one of the gods of the dwarves that promised them their toil in the quest for sky would be greatly rewarded. The quest for sky is to dig themselves out of the cave of the earth to the surface. The party figures that by the looks of this and the elevator that they probably completed their quest.

The last date is that of a king is Kadkar the 17th, which Hailex figures is almost 4,700 years before. He assists Kruznic in opening the big door and it opens very easily. Walking inside of the room, they can tell that this is probably a throne room of sky citadel. They find humanoid bones and footprints scattered about in the room.